


Blank

by stuckatomega



Series: The White Rooms [1]
Category: Bastille (Band)
Genre: Other, implied dyle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-11
Updated: 2017-09-11
Packaged: 2018-12-26 14:31:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12060918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stuckatomega/pseuds/stuckatomega
Summary: Dan gets an internship at the mysterious WWCOMMS HQ.





	Blank

TVs can be overwhelming at the best of times.

 

Imagine a room full of them. Screens line every wall. The noise is cacophonous; the voices merge into one. Images _flash, flash, flash_ in front of you. It’s only a matter of time before you break.

 

Of course, breaking you was the very thing the room was built for.

 

— — — — —

 

Dan took the internship for the money. Sure, the experience would help, but he desperately needed the money. His friends told him not to do it, that he could get money from elsewhere, that working for a massive TV conglomerate was a bad idea. Dan ignored them.  Something about WWCOMMS intrigued Dan, even though he wouldn’t admit it to his friends. Especially not to Kyle. Kyle _hated_ the very idea of company. The thing Kyle hated was the exact thing that Dan was so interested about: the way they were _everywhere_. How could a broadcasting company have so much power and reach?

 

When Dan arrived to the HQ of WWCOMMS, he was greeted by two workers wearing white jumpsuits embroidered with the company’s logo, and sunglasses covering their eyes. Dan looked up at the sky. It was typical British weather, grey and cloudy, so he didn’t understand why the workers wore sunglasses. Regardless, he followed the pair into the building.

‘So… what’s with the sunglasses?’ Dan asked as he tailed the two agents.

Silence. 

‘Alrighty, then…’ Dan was a bit on edge now.

 

What struck Dan about the building was how _white_ it was. The walls, the space-age style doors, the floors. No windows opened up to the outside world, so no colour could filter in.

After walking for what felt like an age, the two workers halted outside of a door, with the words ‘Head Office’ on a plaque above it. One agent made the door open, and the other gestured Dan inside. He nodded and took a step in. The office, naturally, was all white. White desk, white cupboards, white shelves, white chair. Dan couldn’t see who - if anyone - sat in the chair as the back of it faced him. As he took in all the whiteness, the door slid shut behind him, shutting with a gentle _thump_ , causing Dan to look back at the door over his shoulder. When he turned to face the desk again, a man sat facing him. White suit, white shirt, white tie. Dan wasn’t sure why he expected anything else.

 ‘Hello… Daniel?’ the man queried.

 ‘Y-yeah. Dan’s ok though.’

 The man nodded. ‘I’m so glad you decided to join us, Dan. My name is Laslo Panoflex, the boss of this company. Many people dislike us for a vast number of reasons, but I can assure you that we are here to make everyone’s lives better, safer, and happier.’

 

Dan thought back to the argument he had with Kyle when he told his group of friends about the internship. He remembered Will trying to reason with him softly, Woody staring silently at the floor, and Kyle… Kyle yelled and yelled at Dan until he was red in the face and crying. 

  _‘Don’t you remember Charlie, Dan?’_

  _‘I… what do you mean? Of course I remember our fr-’_

  _‘He didn’t remember any of us after starting work there. I haven’t seen him in_ months _, Dan. They’re doing something in there, I know it. A company doesn’t become that influential without pulling some strings in the darkest places.’_

  _‘Maybe I’ll find out, Kyle.’_

 

Dan sighed. He thought about finding Charlie when he had the time.

 ‘Something wrong, Mr. Smith?’ 

 The voice snapped Dan out of his thoughts. ‘Yeah, yeah, I’m fine!’ Dan smiled. ‘Just thinking about something that happened, no biggie.’

Laslo nodded again. ‘Anyway. As I said, I’m glad you decided to join us. As I’m sure you’ve seen, you’ll need a uniform of your own.’ Laslo stood up and walked out from behind his desk to one of the cupboards. He opened it and Dan saw a vast number of the same white jumpsuits that he’d seen the workers who’d escorted him in wearing. Surprisingly, he also saw a few black ones.

 ‘What’s the black ones for?’ Dan asked.

 ‘Those are for the agents who are of the highest ranking, who undertake certain special tasks. It’s of no concern to you.’ Dan nodded and Laslo pulled a jumpsuit out of the cupboard, held it in front of Dan to judge the size, then smiled. ‘Here you go.’

 

— — — — —

 

Dan had been an intern at WWCOMMS HQ for a few days now. He was mostly tasked with cleaning offices, but sometimes he had to clean the canine kennels, where the off-duty guard dogs lived. He was having lunch one day when something surprised him. Or rather, _someone._

 

Charlie.

 

Dan stood up and ran up to Charlie. ‘Hey, Charlie! Hey! It’s me, Dan!’

 Charlie was wearing the usual white jumpsuit… but no sunglasses. Dan looked Charlie in the eye and saw… milky white irises. Charlie’s face showed no emotion, no sign of recognition.

 ‘… Who’s Charlie?’

 Dan was taken aback. ‘ _You. You_ are Charlie.’

 ‘I am Agent 1036, Media Department.’ Charlie said nothing more and turned away from Dan, walking off.

 

Dan stood in the middle of the dining hall, alone. Kyle was right. This company, this place, was so, _so wrong_. 

He decided to confront his boss about his friend.

 

It took Dan a few minutes to find the Head Office again. Once he did, he straightened up and prepared to knock on the door. Just as he held his fist out in front of the door, it opened.

 ‘Come in, Daniel,’ spoke Laslo, looking in Dan’s direction. Dan lowered his arm and confidently strode in.

 ‘What did you do to my friend?’ Dan half-yelled at Laslo, finding it hard to restrain his emotions.

‘Friend…?’ Laslo took a moment to think. ‘Oh, yes, Agent 1036.’

‘ _Charlie. Barnes.’_ Dan responded through gritted teeth. ‘He doesn’t remember me.’

 ‘He wouldn’t.’

 ‘He didn’t remember my friends either when we saw him outside once’

 ‘Neither will you at the end of all this.’

 Dan’s eyes widened slightly. ‘W-what?’

 ‘I’m not letting you go back to your friends. Especially not that rowdy little Kyle.’ Dan held his mouth slightly agape. ‘I know you’re wondering how I know his name. Remember, Daniel, WWCOMMS is here for you… _wherever you are._ ’

 ‘What do you mean, you won’t let me go back?’ was all Dan could muster.

 ‘There are rebels out there, Daniel. I won’t have you give your friends another reason to join them.’

 

Dan was panicking. Quick, shallow breaths. Falling into a panic attack. He wasn’t used to having them alone, to having them without Kyle or Will or Woody - or _Charlie_ \- to make him feel better.

 ‘We’ll fix that, too, Daniel.’ Laslo said. Dan bit his lip and turned to the still-open door, hoping to make a run for it.

 Two agents stood in the doorway, both in the black jumpsuits with the red logos, arms crossed. Laslo gave a slight nod and the two agents stepped towards Dan. Dan would step back in unison until he felt Laslo’s desk press against the small of his back and he could step away no more.

‘Fucking hell dude, what the hell is wrong with you?!’ Dan cried out as the agents took him by the arms.

‘I’m so glad you decided to join us,’ Laslo said, echoing his first words to Dan. 

 

Dan panicked and squirmed and cried out as the two agents dragged him out of the office. The pair were slightly taller than him, and his feet would regularly leave the floor, leaving Dan kicking into air. No matter how hard he tried, the agents were unfazed. 

  _They’ve done this before_ , thought Dan as he continued to try to pull himself free. They passed so many other agents. None of them paid any attention to Dan’s pleas. When Dan realised the futility, he slumped, letting the two agents drag him, feet trailing on the floor, to their destination.

 

The trio entered an elevator. The only colour within it were the green rings of light surrounding the white floor buttons. The agent gripping Dan’s right arm pressed a series of buttons, like a secret sequence, and the rings all turned red. The elevator sped up at a speed that Dan was unused to. Upon arriving at their destination, the elevator doors opened to a black wall with a single, black door, the WWCOMMS logo in white on it. A small control desk was to the left side of the door. The agent to Dan’s left pressed a few buttons after they walked out the lift and the door slid open. Inside the room beyond, Dan saw TVs. _So many TVs_.

 

And a solitary chair in the centre of the room.

 

The pair of agents dragged Dan into the room. As they pulled Dan closer and closer to the chair, Dan noticed sets of straps on the chair and panicked again, fighting and kicking more than he had before. 

  _Was this what happened to Charlie?_

 Dan was slammed into the chair, knocking the wind out of him. He was light-headed from his panic and being winded. Before he could recover, the two agents were strapping Dan into the chair. Leather bound his wrists, his ankles, his thighs to the chair. Dan tried to squirm free as a strap was threaded across his chest and pulled tight, making it even harder for him to breath. The two agents stepped back, their job done, watching Dan continue to pull at his bindings. Dan didn’t notice as they walked out of the room. 

 

A minute or two passed and Dan kept tugging at his restraints… until the screens all lit up. Dan froze and glanced up. The screens all joined together to show one giant picture. The news broadcaster of the company. Grey hair, middle aged, grey suit, unnerving smile.

 ‘Greetings, agent,’ boomed the deep voice of the anchor. Dan winced slightly at how loud the voice was. ‘I understand you’ve been… unproductive. Soon you’ll be the picture of a perfect representation of WWCOMMS.’

The anchor gave a smile, his teeth white and glinting. The screens all shut off suddenly and Dan looked around. And then it began.

All the TVs turned on again at once, all their speakers on full. TV stories with news anchors all speaking in hundreds of different languages. Flashing propaganda messages. Singular eyes glaring at Dan and rolling in their sockets.

Dan screamed, straining his wrists against the straps, wanting to cover his ears. The TVs drowned him out.

 

— — — — —

 

Kyle was concerned about Dan. He hadn’t heard from Dan in ages. As he looked back through their text conversations, he felt his eyes welling up. It was happening again.

He knew a news segment was being filmed in town that afternoon. He was going to go to find, and bring back, both of his friends.

Kyle stood several feet from where the cameras were being set up. Hardly anyone was watching; nobody cared. WWCOMMS filmed in public a lot.

 

Several workers dressed in white overalls and sunglasses appeared as if from nowhere. Kyle perked up and scanned desperately for Dan and Charlie.

 He saw Dan. At the back of the line of workers. He was unusually composed: back straight, head up, _confident_ in a way that was uncomfortable to Kyle. Dan was shy in public, always with his eyes to the ground, shoulders rolled forward.

 Kyle walked over to his best friend. One friend was better than none. He pushed through workers and stood in front of Dan.

 ‘Danny.’

 

No response.

 

‘Daniel! Come on!’ Kyle exclaimed through gritted teeth.

 ‘… I am Agent 1302, do I know you?’ replied the older man. Kyle swore he could hear his heart break. 

  _No. Please no. Not again,_ Kyle thought, eyes looking Dan up and down. ‘I told you, you shouldn’t have taken this internship!’ Kyle yelled. He watched as the face of his best friend gave no reaction, no hint of emotion at all.

 

Dan turned away from Kyle, ignoring Kyle’s gentle sobs as he went to work preparing the cameras.

 

— — — — —

 

TVs can be overwhelming at the best of times.

 

Imagine a room full of them. Screens line every wall. The noise is cacophonous; the voices merge into one. Images _flash, flash, flash_ in front of you. It’s only a matter of time before you break.

 

Then you can go on to break the hearts everyone who loved you.


End file.
